Agenda item

[Report of the Director for Children’s Services. To be introduced by the Cabinet Member for Children and Families]

The report outlines the way in which Haringey Council, Haringey Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) and the Metropolitan Police (‘the safeguarding partners’) will work together with other partners to deliver the new multi-agency safeguarding arrangements in order to safeguard and promote the welfare of children and young people in Haringey.

The Cabinet Member for Children and Families introduced the report, emphasising that safeguarding children is the highest priority of  a Council and seeking approval to the proposed new local multi-agency safeguarding arrangements to promote the welfare of children in the borough and to be referred to as “Haringey Safeguarding Children’s Partnership,

In considering the new safeguarding arrangements outlined in the report, it was noted that these were developed as a consequence of the 2016 Wood review and publication of Working Together to Safeguard Children 2018. There was a requirement to replace LSCBs with new local multi-agency safeguarding arrangements to be determined by the local authority, CCG and the police. The arrangements, critically, required the three statutory partners of the Council, Police and Health working together to develop ways of working to safeguard children. All three partners were equal partners and would act as a strategic leadership group to ensure safeguarding arrangements were robust and working effectively.

The Cabinet noted the arrangement proposals included maintaining the role of the chair of LSCB and contained details about improving the review of a child’s death process, making this more robust. This was to support better learning from child deaths in order to improve care and outcomes, recognising that while the current process has its origin in safeguarding guidance, most preventable child deaths are not connected to safeguarding but largely medical in nature.

Cabinet further noted that, once the arrangements were agreed and published, they would be applicable across the north London boroughs.

In response to questions from Cllr Cawley – Harrison, the following information was noted:

• In line with the core element of the report, which was strengthening the arrangements in place for safeguarding, the three statutory partners would share the responsibility of communication rather than the local authority always being the focus when a communications failure was identified. The Director for Children’s services echoed this and added that there would also be a separate communications strategy for the strengthened arrangements, ensuring these were fully understood across all the staffing levels of the partner organisations.

• In response to concerns about the low number of schools attending the leadership meetings, the mechanism and pathways for all schools and relevant agencies accessing the arrangements and reporting safeguarding concerns was outlined. However, on a practical level, it was not possible to involve a higher number of schools at the leadership group meetings. The Assistant Director for Schools and Learning was a member of the group and would be the contact point, responsible for engaging with the schools and reporting concerns to the leadership group.

• Responding to the question about how safeguarding arrangements were applied to children and young people outside of the education system, there was a process in place to be informed of home-educated children. The local authority was able to make contact but powers were limited. There was also a robust process available through community safety procedures for children and young people moving through different boroughs. Over and above these pathways, there would be some children and young people that the Council and partners did not know about and this was when the strategy of ‘safeguarding is everyone’s responsibility’ was key. This relies upon the wider Council, partner agencies and community reporting concerns. Assurance was given that once agencies were informed of a safeguarding issue then there are set processes that can be enacted.

RESOLVED

1. To approve for publication and implementation the proposed local arrangement for safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children in the borough to be referred to as “Haringey Safeguarding Children’s Partnership” and which is attached as Appendix 1.

2. Subject to any further amendments to be made, to approve for publication and implementation the proposed combined arrangement for child death reviews to be referred to as ‘North Central London Child Death Overview Partners and this is attached at appendix 2. The combined agreement consists of the geographical areas of Barnet, Camden, Enfield, Haringey and Islington.

3. To give delegated authority to the Director of Children Services to agree the final details of the proposed combined arrangement for child death reviews.         

Reasons for decision

Under the Children and Social Work Act 2017, Haringey LSCB is due to be abolished and replaced. The Council, Haringey CCG and Police are required to make new local arrangements for safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children in their area. They have equal and joint responsibility and have greater flexibility and autonomy to determine the local approach to safeguarding children.

The Council and Haringey CCG must also make arrangements for the review of each child death in its area and for the analysis of information about deaths reviewed.

The new safeguarding and child death review arrangements must be published by 29 June 2019 and implemented by 29 September 2019.    

Alternative options considered

In respect of the new safeguarding arrangement, the Council and its safeguarding partners considered the option of a joint arrangement with another area and including Haringey Adult Safeguarding Board and the Community Safety Partnership Board within the new multi-agency partnership arrangements. However, at this stage, it was felt beneficial to retain a strong focus on safeguarding children and minimise the risks inherent in a further change.